


Charlie's favourite joke

by LaurelSilver



Category: Hollywood Undead (Band)
Genre: Dick Jokes, Gen, elemental powers au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-22
Updated: 2020-04-22
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:26:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23766880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaurelSilver/pseuds/LaurelSilver
Summary: Based on diddle-my-decker's elemental powers au.Johnny gets set on fire.
Relationships: Jordon Terrell | Charlie Scene/Randi Terrell, n/a
Comments: 10
Kudos: 13





	Charlie's favourite joke

**Author's Note:**

> Names are useful:  
> Charlie Scene (AKA Terrell, AKA Mr. Undead): fire  
> Johnny 3 Tears: lightning  
> Danny: light  
> Dylan (AKA Funny Man): wind  
> Jorel (AKA J-Dog): Earth  
> Tess (random OC, student journalist)  
> Kieran (random OC, student journalist)
> 
> Also mentioned:  
> Matty (AKA Da Kurlzz): water  
> Randi: Charlie's wife (which is a superpower of itself), has the power to control sound

Needless to say, but I’ll say it anyway; Johnny 3 Tears was not thrilled by the thought of Charlie setting him on fire.

“So,” Jonny sighed, and his torso seemed to deflate a full three inches, “Run me through this again?”

“Okay! So!” Charlie was stood on the coffee table, face sparkling with excitement, “The build up, yeah? You’re gonna be all like;” Charlie stretched his arms out like a cross and attempted to pinch his face into Johnny’s serious expression, complete with the casual lip-lick, “And then when it drops I’ll do my thing and you’ll be like _bwahh!!!_ ” he flapped his arms about, “And it’s gonna be fucking sick!”

“A thoroughly-researched, detailed explanation. What could possibly go wrong on a plan like this.”

“This all sounds exciting,” Danny said, hand reaching out like he could pat Charlie into a more reasonable mood, “But you’ve gotta remember that a lot of these venues have health and safety rules, we can’t go setting people on fire just because it’ll look cool.”

Charlie hopped off the table, pulled a map out of his pocket and unfurled it on the table. The map revealed their tour plan, with the venues circled and surrounded by post-it notes.

“It’s colour-coded,” Charlie said.

And who doesn’t love a bit of colour-coding? The band gathered around the map, pressing in close to read Charlie’s messy writing and giggling at the numerous graffitied dicks. Green signified loose safety rules, yellow for venues who had a few rules, and pink for strict safety rules. He had even found a formula for calculating the heat of the fire he’d generate, and manipulated the variables until he got 420°F.

Johnny rubbed his temples. “Charlie. I can’t survive a temperature that high.”

“It’s too high?” Dylan laughed, “Since when has that been an issue?”

“Since I don’t really wanna burn to death on stage!”

“I’ll only make it a few seconds!” Charlie said. Dylan laughed again.

“Or zero.”

“Or, if you’re that worried, we’ll keep it a small, cool flame, and turn the lights right down. It can’t hurt you, and it’ll still look good.”

“No.”

“Please?”

“No.”

“Pretty please?”

“Fuck no.”

Charlie whined and kicked his feet against the floor, lower lip jutting out.

“Still no.”

“We already upped the lights,” Danny said, “And we get venue staff quizzing us on that. We need to keep a low profile.”

“Since when do rock stars keep low profiles?” Charlie said.

“Since they got super powers,” Jorel said.

“Shut up, plant boy!”

Jorel gasped. “No more weed for you.”

“No!” Charlie threw himself over Jorel, “I love you, plant boy.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Charlie hugged into Jorel’s side.

Johnny rolled his eyes. “Are we done here?”

Most of the band nodded. Charlie was still hugging Jorel, cheek pressed into Jorel’s shoulder, eyes closed like nothing else mattered but loving J-Dog.

“Good. Moving on.”

Johnny stretched, fingers interlaced. His knuckles cracked Little white sparks fizzed in his palms. Orange wrapped around his forearms, pale sleeves crackling against his skin.

Johnny yelped and smacked at the flames. A handprint of his skin, unburnt, opened up and closed back over.

“Jesus Christ, Charlie!” Dylan yelled, jumping up to smack at the flames.

Johnny grunted and shoved Dylan away. The flames remained in place, unbothered by Johnny’s movements, not spreading or growing, just sitting on his skin like a snake had coiled up and gone to sleep there.

“Doesn’t that hurt?” Danny said.

“No,” Johnny said, “It’s kinda cold, actually.”

“Told ya; cold flame,” Charlie said, one hand raised to keep the fire under control, “I’ve been practising.”

“Practising on _what_?” Johnny said.

“Myself, mostly. Throwing things and igniting them. Randi kept making me change the batteries in the smoke alarms so I’ve had to figure out how to create fire without smoke. She don't wanna just mute 'em, could be dangerous if there's a real fire. I've read through a bunch of revision sites too. Bought physics books, they're fucking expensive.”

“Shit,” Jorel said, “You really have put some time in this, huh?”

“Yeah! I’ve done science and math and everything!”

“So why does it say 420° if you’re not gonna burn him that high?” Danny said, managing not to sound disappointed.

“What’s the point in doing math if you’re not gonna find 420?”

“What’s he burning at right now?”

“69°.”

“Oh my god, Charles.”

* * *

Johnny agreed to practice, on the understanding that if he got even slightly too hot just once, the whole stunt was called off.

 _Heart of a Champion_ was amping up. Jorel and Danny stood up on the front podiums, leading the chant of “Compare me to none!” Johnny stood stage centre, fist pumping in time, staring up into the balcony.

The music dropped. The lights dimmed. Johnny put his arms out. He ignited at the waist. The light wrapped around him like a belt and rolled up his torso and down his legs, enveloping his head and swallowing his arms.

The crowd at the front backed away in alarm, several of them yelling and screaming. As the band didn’t react, aside from Charlie’s grin, the crowd gathered back in close. Two girls, who could have been anywhere between 12 and 27, reached up to him like a god. The light danced on their fingers, cold and bright.

Danny brought in the chorus, and the fire fizzled and thinned. Johnny clapped his hands together, unburnt, and he grinned. The girls screamed with delight. Dylan gave Johnny a quick look over, clapped Johnny on the back, and the concert carried right on.

* * *

The aftermath was almost instant. Reddit, Instagram, every social media was exploding with fan footage of the fire. The clips were shared by several magazines, and made final-thought headlines on several news channels.

Their e-mails exploded too, questions not just from magazines but from other performers trying to find out how they pulled the stunt off. Even the Princes of Pyrotechnics, Rammstein, were at a loss, and Charlie had to be physically pinned down and lectured to stop him offering his services to the industrial titans. Sure, Rammstein light their keyboardist on fire at their shows, but their victim wears a huge, unmistakable coat, and the act of setting him on fire has to be an act of itself, lumbering the equipment on stage in a somehow unboring way. But Johnny had just stood there, in his Dove + Grenade tank and jeans, and then he was alight, and then he wasn’t.

Theories circulated, of course. Johnny was stood over a pipe that produced the fire, then the fire jumped three feet to start at his waist. He was wearing some sort of unnoticeable tank of gas under his clothes that he was carrying the whole concert and didn’t explode as soon as it ignited. The fire wasn’t even there, it was edited in to all of the fan footage and the crowd agreed to play along because… reasons.

“This was a mistake,” Johnny said, and the whole band knew what he was referring to without having to ask.

Johnny was watching some small-scale Facebook ‘media news’ personality summarise a few of the theories. Johnny’s favourite so far was one that claimed that the fire was actually expanding foam that just looked orange under the spotlights and then magically cleaned itself up with no slippery residue left on the stage. So far no one had suggested super powers, but Johnny felt that if someone did put that theory forward, it would make too much sense and quickly become the popular theory. Then, they’d be in trouble.

Their powers were difficult to control 24/7, but were usually subtle enough to go unnoticed simply because no one was watching out for them. Stress and anxiety made Johnny give off sparks that couldn’t always be explained as dodgy electrics. Charlie constantly stank of smoke and burnt meat, and little blisters decorated his hands and arms. Jorel’s skin takes on a greenish tint under strong light, and plants perked up and wilted around him depending on his mood. Breezes dance around Dylan, usually just ruffling his hair and clothes, but it was enough to alert people that something was amiss when they felt a breeze indoors. Danny often glowed when he was happy or asleep, and wasn’t aware of it until he was starting to blind somebody near him, or one of his band-mates warning-elbowed him in the stomach.

“You thought it was great when we got off stage,” Charlie sulked. He’d said it four times today. It was his only defence left.

“We shouldn’t have done it,” Johnny said. He went to pick up his coffee. A spark leapt from his palm to the ceramic and the mug exploded into hundred-degree shards.

Jorel jumped, and both the vine in his hands and the potted plants across the room quivered in alarm. He scanned Johnny and sighed. “Where’s Matty when you need him?”

No one laughed. Johnny put his phone down and started to pick up the larger pieces of mug. Danny slid off the couch to help him.

“Hey, J,” Charlie said, “Can I get another blunt?”

“I’ve given you four in the last hour,” Jorel said.

“I wouldn’t need so much if you’d quit giving me such weak shit!”

“Yeah, because you wanted a second one ten minutes after the first! Chill the fuck out!”

“I would if you’d gimme some good fucking weed!”

Dylan flew in, slammed the door and leant on it. Two seconds later someone tried the handle and started knocking in a fury.

“What the fuck,” Jorel said. His vine had vanished, probably wrapped around his arm under his sleeve rather than disintegrated. He hated to do that, even if it was necessary.

“Journalists,” Dylan said, “Ambushed me outside the men’s. Wanna ask about the stunt.”

“I’ll call security,” Danny said.

“No, let em in,” Charlie said, “I can fix this.”

“You’ve gotten us in enough trouble,” Johnny said.

“Let me fix this!”

Charlie stared Dylan down for several seconds, and Dylan relented.

The journalists burst in. They were young, probably interns or even students; a girl with over-bleached hair and under-blended contour, and a boy with a small camera on his shoulder and the sleeves of his too-large shirt rolled up over his elbows. They were both still panting from their run. Dylan wasn’t, but he didn’t pant anymore.

The girl straightened her blazer. “Good afternoon, gentlemen. We’d like a quick interview if that’s not too much trouble.”

The girl sat down and introduced herself, Tess, and her cameraman Kieran. She smiled and there was pink lipstick on her front teeth. Her lipstick was nude.

“What happened here?” she said.

“I dropped my coffee,” Johnny said.

“I can fetch you another if you need it.”

“I’m fine, thanks.”

Kieran passed Johnny a tissue. Johnny gave him a nod of thanks. Kieran pulled a box of small microphones from the side of the camera and held one out to Johnny.

“No thanks,” Johnny said, “Just Terrell.”

Danny audibly winced. When Johnny used not just Charlie’s real name but Charlie’s real _sur_ name, you knew Johnny was pissed as all hell. It didn’t happen as often as you’d think; Johnny was used to Charlie’s hijinks, and it wasn’t often Charlie managed to out-hijink himself. Johnny continued to dab at the wet carpet as Kieran clipped one of the microphones to the front of Charlie’s t-shirt.

“So how are you doing today, Mr Undead?” Tess said.

“Good, good,” Charlie said, “Just… figuring our shit out, y’know. Planning to have some big plans soon.”

Tess gave Kieran a look. Kieran gave her a thumbs-up; the camera was rolling and the microphone was picking up sound.

“So!” Tess continued, “We’re all dying to know: how exactly did you pull off that stunt?”

“Quite easy, really,” Charlie said, “We all have superpowers.”

The room froze. The lights flickered and dimmed. The plant wilted. The air settled like concrete.

“Seriously?” Tess was grinning. As far as she was concerned, she’d hit the jackpot. Kieran was slack-jawed, but was glancing around at the others for some sort of reaction.

“Seriously,” Charlie nodded, “Had ‘em a while. This shaman got us all lined up and hooked us up with some sick skills.”

“What skills, exactly?”

“Well, Johnny controls fire, obviously. Produces some sick fires, this guy,” Charlie clapped Johnny on the shoulder. A spark jumped from Johnny’s skin to Charlie’s, possibly an accident, and Charlie pulled away with a hiss, “He’s hot too. Uh, Danny here controls sound, that’s the only reason we sound good. Jorel, next to you there, he controls air and he uses it to do sick vape tricks.”

“Fucking sick,” Jorel mumbled in agreement. The camera panned over to him and back to Charlie again.

“And Dylan controls, uh,” Charlie stammered a few seconds, “Light. Because, uh, he’s the light of my life.”

Dylan blew him a kiss.

Tess was bouncing in her seat. Kieran glanced around the room again, smirk tugging at his mouth. He thought he was in on the joke. Danny smiled back. The lights had stopped flickering and now glowed warmly, illuminating Charlie in a soft white without being too harsh on camera.

“And what about you?” Tess said, “What do you do?”

“Well,” Charlie sat upright, and Kieran politely zoomed in and focused on Charlie’s face, “When the shaman gave us these powers, I let the guys go first because they deserve it, they’re my heroes. But then by the time he got to me, he only had two powers left. I could have either the perfect memory, or a fucking colossal dick.”

Tess’ grin dropped. The men around her were all giggling, even Kieran. She didn’t interrupt him, that would be bad journalism, but as soon as Charlie had landed his punch line she wrapped up the interview. The recording never surfaced, and within a week the internet accepted that the fire had been a very good projection, and Hollywood Undead was once again that band with that song about dicks.

“And I just,” Charlie sighed, and paused to bite his knuckle before he delivered his punch line, “It’s such a shame, I just can’t for the life of me remember which one I picked.”

**Author's Note:**

> Eat your heart out, Daenerys Targaryen.  
> Wait.
> 
> I've had this idea bouncing around my head for a while now, but I couldn't pick a song to set Johnny on fire to. I've seen Heart of a Champion live (launch concert babey!!) and it was so fucking good.
> 
> Spelling it 'math' physically hurt me.  
> The two girls are based on two friends of mine I went to the launch concert with, one is at university and the other works full time, both constantly get I.D.ed because they look about twelve.  
> It's not actually a good idea to go swinging the camera about during an interview, it ruins the focus. Tess and Kieran are meant to be students at the very beginning of their professional journalism education, so they make silly mistakes like moving the camera too much and falling for dumd jokes.  
> I don't know how diddle-my-decker intended for the guys to get their powers, bu I'll leave it up to you if it was actively given to them or if Charlie pulled that out of his ass.
> 
> I did start really over-thinking these powers as I was writing. Why do they have to be secret? Is Tess excited because powers are rare, or is it considered an honour to develop powers so it's shocking that some rap-rock band would have them? How would you produce fire without ignition? How would you produce fire with no waste (smoke)? Would controlling natural light be different to controlling artificially produced light? How could you make plants disappear? Would they just disintegrate, or rot really quickly, or just grow in reverse until they vanish? Does Dylan only control certain gases like oxygen, or could he manipulate smoke? How could you test this without putting him in an airless vacuum with only the gas you want him to manipulate? If Matty were to clean up a spilt drink, would he only lift the water out leaving a concentrated stain of the remaining (for example) coffee, or would a coffee dust be left, or would he lift the whole drink? Could you even smoke Jorel's generated weed? Could he manipulate it to make it burn longer or taste different? Could Jorel generate weed as it's being burned, creating an infinite blunt? Can powers be used in tandem, e.g. could Danny change the colour of Charlie's fire? If Dylan pulled away the oxygen around Charlie's fire, would the fire go out or would it continue to burn because it's not a naturally made fire? If it continued to burn, then what would that mean about the guys' ability to break physics?If Dylan can manipulate hydrogen and oxygen, could he manipulate them together and therefore manipulate water? Could Danny make Johnny's lightning invisible, or Charlie's fire invisible? What would that even look like?  
> I need to stop now.
> 
> I needed a happy story, and what's happier than Charlie making dick jokes?


End file.
